I don't see too many people frequenting these boards but I'll post here anyway.

I've been taking a supplement called BLOOD SUGAR made by Nature Way. It has all the stuff diabetes need.

Here's what it has:

Chromium, Bitter Melon,Gymnema Sylvestre, and other stuff. Look it up on internet.

I paid something like $8. and change for a bottle of 90 capsules. The dose is 3 pills two times a day with food. Been taking it for about a week.

It hasn't made a HUGE difference but one morning my sugar went down 20 points. And one afternoon I went to 86.

So I've been hunting around my local asian markets to find the actual BITTER MELON fruit.

Guess what? This morning I found it. I made sure it was Bitter Melon. I noticed it, I asked the lady and she said "Bitter Melon". I then checked it with the images online, then I went to youtube and learned how to cook it. I'm cooking it right now, with onions, garlic, and turmeric.

I couldn't care less if it tastes good or not. If it helps to get me finally off of my insulin, it will be a gift.

I'm on 18 to 20 units of Lantus a day. That's it.

I would like to be off of it completely.

If I do it, great, if not, well I'll be on Lantus.

But I have to try.

Look up Bitter Melon, and then go on youtube. There are so many videos demonstrating how to cook it and how good it is for diabetics. It's an old Indian alternative to diabetic meds.

Can't hurt. I took out the middle part (the seeds), and I washed it and cut it into circles, which I then soaked in salt water. Squeezed all the water out.

Then I did the onion and garlic thing, and turmeric, and then added the rings of the Bitter Lemon.

So in 10 minutes, we shall see what I have.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY.

Wouldn't this be a cool thing to find out on Mother's Day?

I walked out of that Asian market singing out loud!!!

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME!!! HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME!!!

will update if this helps my blood sugar.

Melody

That is very interesting Mel.

I found this and will try it:
http://www.swansonvitamins.com/Searc...d=Bitter+Melon

I really don't want all that other stuff in the caps like in the Nature's Way product. I also don't want to take 6 a day, because all that other stuff is in there.

I'll let you know how it goes. I'll do this for 6mos, and then have my check up in Sept.

I think the G. sylvestre in it is synergistic to the bitter melon.
The other ingredients in yours "less so".

Yeah, I don't think my bitter lemon pills are going to do anything drastic. I'll stick to the actual bitter lemon itself.

I'm going to check your link.

And you HAVE to go and try and buy a bitter melon fruit.

You'll pucker up like you can't imagine. It's THAT bitter.

lol
Melody

Mrs. D.

Just went to your link on Swanson. They have two kinds of pills AND CHEAP!!!

Full spectrum and momordica.

Which one are you trying??

I'm going to order the 600mg one.

BTW when I was in college, I worked in the medicinal chemistry labs to put myself thru school. My third year I worked with a grad student (his name was Subba --first name) doing research on G.sylvestre! He was from India and was looking for the active drug that the herb might contain. The extraction process took a month for each batch, and yielded a dry powder of mixed alkaloids, which I gave to him. A very small amount. Less than a packet of Splenda for comparison!

My job was to extract it. To begin,it was delivered in raw green crushed leaf to the Natural Resources building loading dock. I had to fill up a huge platform cart (my then fiancee hubby to be helped me) and we dragged these canvas baggies across campus on foot to the Chem Building. They looked like bags of MJ! We laughed the whole way thinking some radical hippies would hijack us!

Imagine my surprise when over a decade ago, I see on all the herbal sites (when we get our first computer), all the monographs on G. sylvestre! It appears that no drug was elicited from the research, and it remains an herbal OTC intervention! So it has GREAT NOSTALGIA for me. I can still chuckle over it!!! heheheheheheheheheh...

Great Story!!!

Oh, I wanted to see if Puritans Pride had Bitter Melon and if they had one of those buy 2 get 3 free.

Well!!! how curious is this? They sell 27 products for blood sugar. Around 25 or so, they offer the buy 2 get 3 free. And they DO sell bitter melon pills.

but NOT for Bitter Melon.

It's $9.99

Look it up, You'll see what I mean, I don't understand what is so special about this product that they won't do the buy 2 get 3 free. I mean, I got my Methyl b-12 buy 2 get 3 free.??

Very curious!
Melody

They won't do the buy one get one...etc free sales on products they buy and don't make themselves. Sometimes this changes as prices to them come down.

Methyl B12 is so cheap, it is not an issue. But other things still remain high. Puritan's does not have the best prices on EVERYTHING, but it remains a good resource for many things.

Mrs. D.

Last night I boiled some Biter Melon and I was able to have a side dish with my dinner. I saved the water, thinking, (before I go to bed, I'll have a small glass (if I can get it down).

Well, I never laughed so hard in all my life. You should have seen me at 10 p.m. putting this glass to my lips, taking a sip and then saying 'Oh my god, this is awful". I couldn't drink the rest.

I only took a sip, so I don't think this did anything to my sugar readings, but I have been eating a portion of this stuff for two days now.

This morning, when I got up, my sugar was 160. It goes down during the day especially after I eat something for lunch. It's always a sprout salad with either grilled fish, a piece of salmon, or some water packed tuna (for protein), and some lovely tomatoes and other veggies in my salad. My sugar always goes DOWN one hour after I eat my lunch. So, so far, so good.

Before the bitter melon, my sugar would sometimes be 180 in the morning. Not always, some times it would be 168, once it was even 130. I said HURRAH.

So I shall continue to make bitter melon every day as a side dish and see where this leads. I have the pills but to me, they don't do what the actual food does. I might be wrong, but who knows.

Maybe you'll have luck with the pills that you get. Let me know if this is so.

Oh, one thing I would like to know. It DOES TAKE SOME TIME, for this bitter melon thing to work on the sugar in the body, right?

It's not an overnight "GLORY BE", moment, right??

I mean, it's not an over night miracle.

Unless it's insulin, I don't think ANYTHING is an over night fix.

That's why I eat the way I do.

Small but steady improvements.

Melody